Study: Driving While Stoned Is Very Dangerous, But Not As Risky As Drunk Driving

You might have a friend — or you might even be that person — who swears that they actually drive better after smoking a bit of marijuana (I believe the kids call it “reefer”); that it clears their head and helps them focus. But a new study confirms what many people had probably already guessed: that smoking pot and driving isn’t exactly a good idea.

According to a new investigation by researchers in Canada, driving within three hours of smoking pot puts almost doubles your risk being in an accident that leads to serious injury or death.

From Time.com:

They found that recent marijuana use was associated with a 92% increased risk of fatal or near-fatal accidents. The better the quality of the study, the more likely it was to show an increase in marijuana-related risk.

The risk for minor collisions, however, was not raised significantly — possibly reflecting the fact that many stoned drivers attempt to be more cautious and can therefore compensate for some risks. That compensation may fail, however, when quick reflexes are most needed.

But impairment from pot alone is still less risky than driving while under the influence of alcohol. Someone driving with a blood alcohol concentration of .08 (the legal limit) triples the chances of an accident and a small increase to .10 nearly quintuples that risk.

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I’m not proud of it, but I’ve done both in my life (not for a long time), and in my experience, one of the big differences between the two is speed. When I drove intoxicated, I was far more likely to not notice that my foot was pushing on the accelerator, and I’d look up and see I was going 85. In contrast, being stoned usually, if anything, resulted in my driving under the speed limit.

I was driving home from a friend’s house down a NJ highway probably 15 years ago. I have no idea what speed I was going, but I felt like I was doing 180. It was probably more around 40-45, but at least I was in the right hand lane. (Do 45 on a NJ highway, even on the right, and you’ll get eaten alive.) The constant stream of cars flying by passing me did not deter the perception I had that I was going too fast. I couldn’t seem to correlate in my brain all the cars passing me and the side of the road moving too damn fast, so I kind freaked a little, and got the hell off the next exit and took the back roads. (Probably at a crawl just above idle speed I can imagine.)

Yeah…and I understand that that kind of driving is its own kind of dangerous, but I never felt as out of control as when hurtling down the freeway at excessive speeds with dulled reflexes. Also, weaving was never an issue for me while driving high. It was slow decision-making that was really the most dangerous thing (at least, that’s what it felt like).

My one memorable experience resulted in every shadow cast across the road at the edge of my headlights’ illumination seemed to be an animal crossing the road. It was also really late and I was close to nodding off near the end of the my (100 mile, that night) drive home. Definitely not something I’d want to repeat.

For the other side of things, while I would not deny that booze inhibits reflexes, I have found that a small amount actually relaxes me to the point where I can function more smoothly than my baseline. It’s a narrow precipice, however, built upon the fact that between pain and stress, my baseline is typically not the peak of my ability to focus on a task.

The same idea goes for playing pool. It’s a reverse parabola of ability based on the number of beers one drinks. After a beer, I’m a little better…after two, I’m really getting into a groove. After three, I’m pretty damned good, but every beer thereafter, there’s a marked decreased in my performance.

No I know that exact feeling. I made the mistake of driving once.. on a highway. I felt like I was being pummelled by cars on every side, the idea of merging or changing lanes was terrifying. I was going at least fifteen under the limit and I was really scared of being hit by all the cars flying by me.

Having driven a little tipsy before, I find that I was much more likely, as Honey Badger was, to speed a little after drinking. All in all, it’s just not good to drive if you’re impaired- especially if you’re overly tired. I remember a time when I was working days and nights with odd breaks here and there for sleep, and I convinced myself that driving with one eye open was okay.. no, no it wasn’t okay. I just was so tired and wanted to get home so badly I was endangering myself and everyone around me. I’m just glad that didn’t end poorly.

Driving tired is very dangerous. I had a friend in vocational college when I went, really nice kid. He was the first person in his family to graduate high school. He got a scholarship to the college so he could have a trade. He was renting an apartment with a friend near the school and working two part-time jobs to make ends meet, plus going to school full-time. He was heading home from one of his jobs in the evening and must have fallen asleep behind the wheel. His car hit a bridge abutment, he was thrown out and the car rolled over him and killed him. That was a very sad day, not only for his family, but for the school and his friends, as he was really trying hard to make a good life for himself, and would have gone far.

That is actually dangerous for anyone else who might be on the road. It would make it even more difficult for the person without their seatbelt to control their car which would make the accident worse than it would have been with the seatbelt, not to mention if they were ejected and hit another car…

Not from personal experience of course, but I’ve found that stoned drivers are hyper aware of their speed and physical attributes (ie, how hard they are pushing the pedal), whereas drunks have no idea. Pot most certainly seems safer to drive under than while texting, for example.

Because this COULD be a relevant consumer issue. Marijuana being legal, costs of impaired driving, how to easily discern under the influence if marijuana is legal (no breath test), what level of marijuana in the blood stream would be legal etc. are all interesting spins that could have been added by the writer to encourage relevant consumer-based discussion in the comments and to simply get people thinking. Instead the author of the blog post just summarized an article, leading (likely) too broad and not consumer focused discussion, and limited critical thinking by the readers.

Oookay. It’s an interesting study, and only one of them, based on statistics, and not much else. It’s still a pretty useful piece of information, even if it’s not exactly what you would like. Also, if that’s what you meant, why not just say that instead of just re-stating the article? Your original comment wasn’t very useful, itself … ironic!

The irony was intentional. And what I’d like? I’d like blog posts to either relate directly to consumer issues, OR take more broad information like this one, and take less then five minutes to talk about how it can affect consumer issues.

I know I am not required to visit, nor comment on this website, however it is distressing that the quality has gone down so dramatically over the years and the focus has become less and less about consumer issues. This is a great blog that can do and has done a lot of good things for consumers and has provided (for the internet) pretty intelligent discussion, and it is unfortunate when simple corners are cut.

Well, since something like 17 million Americans are current marijuana consumers, I’d say the entire issue of marijuana, its legalization, its contributions to road accidents, etc., is a consumer issue.

Not disagreeing, but the author did nothing to tie the article to the theme of the blog at all, simply summarizing the article. You did more research then the author to tie it into a consumer theme in your one comment.

It was cutting corners, and as a result there is not a good discussion about this article.

I’m all for marijuana legalization for adults. At the same time, I’m all for treating driving while stoned just as harshly as we treat driving while drunk. If we ever want to have marijuana fully legal in the U.S., we have to stop comparing driving stoned to driving drunk. We have to demonstrate that marijuana users are just as responsible as alcohol users, and to do that we have to stop pretending that driving stoned is somehow better than driving drunk.

Nice, apparently if your a scientist and release a study, it becomes fact. No need for peer review or additional trials from other parties. /s

One study says something, another says something else. It depends on the quantity of intake and maybe the strain. The problem is that they can’t measure how stoned someone is through a device as they can with alcohol. Another reason the feds won’t legalize it.

I don’t think this study involved trials and experimental and control group. It looks like they went through accident statistics and vetted their data that way. It would, after all, be a bit unethical to get people high and drunk, then compare how many of their traffic accidents resulted in fatalities ;)

Technically, they can’t exactly quantify your BAC with a breathalyzer either. From the top of my head, there are a couple problems:

1) How you breathe can affect what it says your BAC is. If I remember right, the reasoning was that the alcohol laden portion of your breath is among the last to be exhaled, so if you hyperventilate or don’t exhale all the way, you can lower what it says is the BAC.

2) It assumes a standard value for a couple things involved in the math. If your hemocrit happens to be lower you will read artificially high and vice versa. For men it’s more or less in the middle. For women it’s at the high end. It also assumes that there’s a standard for how much alcohol someone would exhale per breathe as opposed to how much is in their blood. This also varies from person to person and can skew it one way or another.

Now, blood test, yeah, those are pretty accurate. And, they can measure how much of the metabolite is in your blood after your light one up. Different strains equal different amounts of certain compounds, ergo the more you smoke or if you smoke a different strain, they can figure it out by the volume of metabolites in your blood; I can guarantee you that IF it gets legalized they’ll figure out a way to test people for determining how stoned they are. If it’s accurate or not is an entirely different story.

I’ve never smoked pot (or a cigarette for that matter) in my life and I can not find a single reason why it is illegal beyond some antiquated fears.

Also don’t completely blame this on the right, democrats have been just as bad keeping it illegal. The most recent legislation trying to make it legal was by a libertarian leaning Republican (Ron Paul) and a Democrat (Barney Frank).

If you’re going to be opening up a political dialogue, I agree with some of what you say – that there are conservatives, typically the libertarian types who want the government to mind its own business – who support the legalization of marijuana. However, I just don’t believe your assertion that the democrats have been “just as bad” at keeping it illegal. I would bet you all the money I have that as a percentage of the entire group, more registered democrats would vote to legalize marijuana than registered republicans.

Similarly, I would be surprised if there weren’t more pro-legalization democrats in Washington than pro-legalization republicans. That said, this is one of those issues where I think that most politicians won’t give you their honest opinion, regardless of where they stand on the issue, because of how it polls with the public. It’s similar to gay marriage that way – when asked during election campaigns whether they’re for gay marriage, many (including Obama) will tell you they’re against it, which I just don’t believe to be the case in many instances.

more registered democrats would vote to legalize marijuana than registered republicans.

I agree 100%, but unfortunately at the federal level, this does not matter. Sure it does for states to either decriminalize or allow for medical use, but federal law trumps and limits those measures.

I would be surprised if there weren’t more pro-legalization democrats in Washington than pro-legalization republicans.

I agree with this paragraph as well, but if you are not willing to publicly endorse it, then your personal views are of little use, unless you then flip-flop when it comes time to vote. A flip-flopper is not something to be proud of either. I say “just as bad” because while more republicans may be openly against it, democrats who are privately for it, will not stand up publicly. Neither of which helps.

never smoke either one. I can stand around people smoking, I cough like crazy. I drink once in awhile. About..2-3 times a year.

I think fear is used to keep people thinking pot is ‘evil’.

I think it all has to do with the Pharmaceutical. Imagine people having their own little plant that can get rid of pain. Easy to grow, easy to reproduce. Nobody will ever need to buy aspirin or any other pain medicine.

They are even safer (less side affect and not as addictive) than some drugs used in the hospital.

Never smoked pot myself but just like alcohol I think if you want to do it in the confines of your home and keep your intoxicated butt away from the public fine.

Must admit just the stench of pot is enough to keep me away. I USED to smoke cigars & cigerettes for years and even then I thought pot was a stench let alone an illegal DRUG.

I think we’re too early in the statistical study of pot use and driving. There have been DECADES of alcohol related driving statistics but other than the occassional driver who got a blood test where do pot impaired driving statistics come from.

What’s the difference between a drunk and a stoner? The drunk will drive at 70 mph and think he’s doing 30 mph, while the stoner will be going 30 mph and think he’s doing 70 mph. And it’s sort of true.

“Tell me, officer, do you have any idea how fast you were going?”
“Well, I got a 426 hemi here, 3/4 cams, nitro boosters. I can get her up to as good as 155! Never do, though, unless I’m chasing a cute chick in a Ferrarri! I guess I was going about..65, tops.”
“SEVEN! SEVEN miles an hour! And normally when I stop people, they pull onto the SHOULDER!”

lol. Can’t deny that. After being away from the LA basin for a couple years it was kind of a culture shock getting used to 85 mph down the 405 again. Got too used to rarely exceeding 70 (and this coming from a guy who would rarely let a night go by without triple digit speeding before moving away)

(and personally speaking, I have calmed down since then. lol. getting old)

I find the time estimates to be suspect. I use to smoke a fair amount in my youth and I rarely had a buzz that last more than two or three hours, with the max effect lasting about an hour. Pot is not like alcohol, were it can take a half a day or more to get out of your system. It is a quick high that fades almost as quickly. Still, I agree that you shouldn’t smoke and drive, especially right after smoking. I’m always amazed by the hypocrisy from pot smokers regarding this issue. There is a radio DJ I like to listen to that freely admits to being a heavy toker on air. I’ve heard him comment numerous times that DUI suspects should face heavy prison for even first offenses, yet several times he has come on air and admitted to getting completely baked before driving around town. Nice double standard.

Like other people have chimed in, I did this ONCE when I was a teenager. It took me about 20 minutes to get to the mall, which was normally a 10 minute drive. I was going under the speed limit and it took me forever to park. I was dangerously hypervigilant.

For purposes of this forum “I know someone who frequently does both” and has logged over a thousand examples of driving under both impairment states, over hundreds of thousands of miles, who has never been in an accident, drunk , stoned, or sober, in both a SUV, a sportscar, and a motorcycle in all sorts of weather conditions at all sorts of times, day and night, in high traffic situations and during periods of low traffic activity.

Although I understand the rules exist to protect everyone, and I am glad we have them, I STRONGLY feel it is user specific and not all-encompassing. This means in an honest and fair world, there should be another driving test that allows for the performance under drugs. While we are at it, there should be one for driving a over the speed limit as well.

Police have to pass an exam that allows them to exceed the speed limit during emergencies, so why not the general public?

Distracted driving is far worse at times than both tipsy driving, and stoned driving. I would rather have auto manufactures be required to install a device that disables phones in all cars, rather than fine or incarcerate people for driving stoned.

These are ideas I throw out there as conversation points. I am just saying.

I am in full support of legalizing marijuana, but even though “a close friend of mine” smokes weed every day, I still kinda have to admit that driving when stoned can be a bad idea at times, depending on how high one is.

I think it’s a silly notion to have a test to determine if a particular person is OK to drive drunk. Science has shown that driving drunk impairs a person’s ability to drive safely.

Obviously the legal limit might not really reflect how intoxicated an individual person truly is, and that is because life is unfair and there will always be outliers for every generality.

Also: Lack of accidents or DUI convictions for someone who regularly drives drunk is not exactly evidence that they are a safe driver. All it really indicates is that they beat the odds.

I think one of the reasons these statistics are in the potheads favor is that unlike alcohol which has a field sobriety test how do you detect pot use of a driver on the spot. If a pothead blows a redlight or something he or she will just get a ticket for blowing the light and not impaired driving. Unless they’re doing a cheech and chong with smoke blowing out of the windows.

The police officer’s test is temporal recognition. As silly as it sounds (well walking a straight line is silly too). So they tell you to count to 25 silently while they look at their watch, and tell them when you’re done. Apparently stoned people can’t do this effectively. They claim it reveals if you have smoked within the past 24 hours.

Also if a person runs a red light because they are texting, what hope is a silly test going to do to reveal that cause?

A DUI lawyer can check for things like breathalyzer test, calibration and training. With physical symptoms only a police officers training can be brought into question. And if a question arises the conviction might get thrown out. I think an alcohol related dui with a breathalyzer is much more of a slam dunk to pile on those statistics.

I just think right now technology makes it’s much easier to document & demonstrate an alcohol related dui. The tools are there for alcohol, they aren’t for pot other than a blood or hair test which can’t be done on the spot like a breathalyzer. So for now the potheads look safer only because of the inability to document it’s use.

In some Australian states, every police car has a breathalyzer and a drugs test, which you scrape your tongue with. Takes about 10 minutes to get a result, but it’s better than letting someone who’s on drugs back on the road.

Every pizza driver I know seems to do it just fine. I don’t think it should be legal, but I would definitely rather deal with a stoned driver than one talking or testing on their cell phone. I certainly don’t get the uneducated fools who would try to cite this study as an example of why it shouldbe kept illegal. I look at them as a complacent pawn siding with our government and their buddies the drug cartels.

Every pizza driver I know seems to do it just fine. I don’t think it should be legal, but I would definitely rather deal with a stoned driver than one talking or testing on their cell phone. I certainly don’t get the uneducated fools who would try to cite this study as an example of why it shouldbe kept illegal. I look at them as a complacent pawn siding with our government and their buddies the drug cartels.

If you’d really like to know drinking limit and age are pretty much uniform throughout the states, the answer, as always, is money. Specifically:

In 1998, as part of the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century
(TEA-21), a new Federal incentive
grant was created to encourage
States to adopt a .08 BAC illegal
per se level.
In 2000, Congress passed the DOT
Appropriations Act of FY 2001,
adopting .08 BAC as the national
illegal limit for impaired driving. The
statute provides that States that do
not adopt a conforming .08 BAC
law by October 1, 2003, will be
subject to a withholding 2 percent
of certain highway construction
funds.

Yeah…it’s one of those interesting issues that people don’t talk about (because it’s unpopular to seen as endorsing drunk driving), but alcohol laws fall under states’ right, and if they wanted to raise it back to .15, they could. However, the federal government essentially penalizing states that do not fall in line with federal law basically uses money to trump the Tenth Amendment.

The whole problem I have with arbitrary limits is they do not take in the account the drives tolerance to alcohol. BAC is not uniform. Someone who is a heavy drinker would not even be buzzed at 0.08%, were as someone who rarely drinks might be impaired at 0.06%. When I use to drink I could down a six pack and feel nothing, now on the rare occasion when I drink even a glass of wine I can feel it right away.

I agree with you there…the funny thing is that they can apply that reasoning, but only when it works against you. If you’re weaving and get pulled over, but only blow a .04, you still get a DUI or a wet reckless. However, if you’re driving perfectly fine and get pulled over for having a tail light out, then the cop smells alcohol on your breath and breathalyzes you and you blow a .10, you’re screwed no matter what.

yeah…I think NH would gain federal highway money if we adopted a seat belt law. our state motto might be Live Free or Die, but sometimes I think it’s Live Free AND/OR Die….the living free tends to lead to the dead part

Don’t worry, it will soon be 0.05, then 0.02. What is funny is that you can blow a 0.02 even if you haven’t drank anything due to your bodies own natural digestive process, yet some states will have limits that low for minor drivers. So you could be accused of DUI even when you haven’t had a single drop of alcohol. That is a MADD wet dream.

I don’t condone drunk driving but someone who drives .08 shouldn’t suffer the same consequences as someone who drives e.g 0.50. .08 or “slightly buzzed” should be like careless driving and shitface drunk should be tough penalties, license revoked, etc.

Imagine if speeding 1mph over the limit was treated with the harshest penalty. That’s basically what’s happening.

Traffic is backed up for miles after a semi-truck pulling a reefer crashed from a high overpass into the grass and weeds below. Witnesses say the accident happened around 4:20 when the reefer rolled several times before being clipped by a blunt drainage pipe. The driver, described as a giant fatty, fled the scene and was later captured while consuming a Quarter Pounder.”

This study isn’t accurate, just like most marijuana studies. Why? Because marijuana effects everyone differently. Different types or strains of marijuana yield different effects – for different types of people. The amount used, and the frequency of use yields varying results.

For example what if you smoked a strain of pot you’ve never used before and it turns out you’re allergic? (Yes, it happens – and it’s not pretty). Or what if one particular strain of marijuana causes excessive anxiety & heart palpitations, or perhaps near-disabling recursive thought patterns (brain running in a loop)?

Well, that may be worse that texting and/or driving with your knees after a 6 pack. It all depends on the person. At least with alcohol the results are usually predictable with everyone, especially related to driving impairment. Marijuana abusers (

What’s the difference between a drunk driver and a stoned driver? The drunk driver will blast right through a stop sign like its not even there. A stoned driver will stop and wait for it to turn green…….

The “Not as risky” part is mainly because there is no “legal limit” for pot. You’re comparing drunk (4 beers+) with people who’ve only smoked a little pot. If you take into account people with ANY alcohol, the results would be a lot different. I don’t think there is any direct way to compare, but, it’s certainly just as possible to get blacked out stoned as it is blacked out drunk.

I’ve never heard of anyone getting “blackout stoned”, but you have to admin there’s a difference between taking one hit and driving an hour later, compared to packing a fatty, smoking the whole thing, and getting behind the wheel 5 minutes later.